The British government on Sunday appointed Blaise Metreweli as the country’s first woman to serve as chief of the UK’s foreign spy service MI6.
But though she will be the first woman to lead the agency, Britain – and the world – have long had women play leading roles in espionage.
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So who is Metreweli, what does the boss of MI6 – also known as “C” – do, and who are some of the other female spies that have left a mark on the field?
Who is Blaise Metreweli?
Metreweli, 47, is a career intelligence officer. Until her appointment as head of MI6, she was the director general of technology and innovation at MI6, also known as “Q”.
She joined MI6 as a case officer in 1999, and has held a range of roles since then. She has worked in Europe and the Middle East for the agency, and speaks Arabic, according to United Kingdom media.
In the past, she has also worked at MI5, Britain’s domestic intelligence agency.
She studied anthropology at Cambridge University’s Pembroke College.
What is the role of the M16 chief?
The chief is the only publicly named member of MI6 staff and reports directly to the British foreign secretary, a position currently held by David Lammy.
M16 was formed in 1909 and collects overseas intelligence to understand threats to, and opportunities for, the UK and its overseas interests.
The agency also works in tandem with other British intelligence services, including MI5 and the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), which focuses on intercepting and analysing electronic signals and also works on cybersecurity. MI6 also works on key partnerships such as the Five Eyes which comprise Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and the United States.
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Metreweli will be MI6’s 18th C. She will replace Richard Moore, who led the agency for the past five years.
Reacting to Metreweli’s appointment, Moore said: “I am absolutely delighted by this historic appointment of my colleague, Blaise Metreweli to succeed me as ‘C’. Blaise is a highly accomplished intelligence officer and leader, and one of our foremost thinkers on technology.”
In 2021, Moore said that China was the single greatest priority for M16. Recently, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer insisted that Russia poses a threat to Europe. While announcing a boost in defence infrastructure earlier this month, Starmer said: “The threat we face is more serious, more immediate and more unpredictable than at any time since the Cold War.”
Green ink and the codename: Why is the chief called ‘C’?
A common misconception is that C stands for chief. The chief is actually called C because Naval Officer Mansfield Smith-Cumming, the first to become chief in 1909 signed his name as C. The practice has stuck since, Moore, the outgoing C, told BBC Radio 4 in 2021.
Another immortalised practice in the spy service is that C only writes in green ink, physically and digitally, because Cumming would tend to do so, according to Moore. “Anyone getting a note in green ink knows it comes from me, and the same is true of the typescript on my computer,” Moore said in 2021.
Who are some other female spy chiefs in the UK and other countries?
Three years before Judi Dench played the first female boss of MI6 in the James Bond film, GoldenEye, Stella Rimington became the first woman director general of the real MI5 after working in different roles in the service since 1969.
In 2002, Eliza Manningham-Buller became the director general of MI5 after working for the service since 1974.
Anne Keast-Butler currently leads GCHQ. She was previously the deputy director general of M15.
In the US, Tulsi Gabbard currently serves as the director of national intelligence for President Donald Trump. Her predecessor under former US President Joe Biden was also a woman, Avril Haines.
Gina Haspel was the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 2018 to 2021. In Australia, Kerri Hartland leads the foreign intelligence collection agency, the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS).
During World War II in particular, women played an important role in espionage.
Prominent spies for the British Special Operations Executive (SOE) included Noor Inayat Khan, Violette Szabo and Krystyna Skarbek.
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Szabo, who spent time in France during her childhood and could speak French fluently, was on a mission in France when she was captured by the Nazis and executed in a concentration camp.
Inayat Khan was a radio operator sent to Nazi-occupied France, where she was arrested and executed by the Gestapo, the secret police service of Nazi Germany. Skarbek, also known by her codename Christine Granville was a Polish SOE agent, carrying out missions across Nazi-occupied Europe and escaping German capture twice.
During World War II, American spy Virginia Hall evaded the Gestapo, organising groups of agents, recruiting French residents for safe houses and helping escaped prisoners of war.
Melita Norwood, a British citizen, was one of the longest-serving spies for the Soviet Union, serving for nearly four decades from World War II through the Cold War. She provided the Soviet Union with information about the British atomic weapons programme. British intelligence was only able to confirm she was a spy in the late 1990s, long after she had retired. She died in 2005, aged 93.
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